Nordic committee on bioethics in junction with the Norwegian biotechnology board, organized a miniconference on the new Crispr/Cas technology and the genetic modification of human embryos. The conference was held at the University of Oslo, June 2nd. The title was Gene therapy and human germline editing: new opportunities, new challenges.

We heared great talks by Fredrick Lanner, Gunnar Kvalheim, Johanna Ahola-Launonen, Jacob Wang, Anne-Marie Gerdes and Nils-Eric Sahlin, and were then given the task to summarize the meeting.

I will not attempt to do that here, because my notes were incomplete and the things I said didnt quite follow the notes (either a plus or minus, Im not sure).

The new technologies open some new opportunities, for studying the effects of mutations and systems on human cells and early development. There is also the future possibility of using this technology to modify the human cells, to correct serious errors in DNA to treat (somatic) or to prevent (germline) devastating diseases. The current seems to be flowing in that direction, granting of course that the technology will become efficient enough and side effects can be minimized. In fact this is the first moment that I felt that steps towards germline could and perhaps should be taken.

To counter, there were several issues raised with further developing the technology for modifying human embryos, including the slippery-slope argument, side-effects, dont-mess-with-nature, and a few others. But in general they are no unique to this technology.

The only new concept is that we may alter the genetic makeup of our species directly with this new technology. But in fact we have been changing our genetic makeup, indirectly with choices in lifestyle and human history and technological development.

In sum, I learned a lot but am still confused about the subject.

Those who want to read more should check out a new statement and report by the Danish council on ethics which summarized these issues quite well.

Statement from the Danish Council on Ethics on genetic modification of future humans (2016)